


contribute to the chaos

by TheThirdTemptationOfParis



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angst, Crowley is Raphael, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, The Fall - Freeform, loosely based on Twin Size Mattress by The Front Bottoms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-20 14:47:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19993966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheThirdTemptationOfParis/pseuds/TheThirdTemptationOfParis
Summary: i wanna contribute to the chaos, i don't wanna watch and then complain, 'cause i'm through finding blame, that is the decision that i have made.





	contribute to the chaos

There were whisperings in Heaven. _Lucifer. A rebellion. God is angry. Raphael’s asking questions. She might cast them out._

The whisperings made Aziraphale uneasy. Especially the ones about Raphael. If he, an Archangel, was questioning God Herself, it spelled disaster. 

Raphael. _His_ Raphael was on the verge of being cast out. Aziraphale would not let it stand. He would talk to the Almighty himself if he had to. 

Back then, before the Fall, all angels of all ranks had access to Her sector of Heaven. Angels would come and go as they pleased, receiving directions and praise for the works they had been doing. All of the Archangels lived close by, and when Aziraphale knocked on the door of Raphael’s dwelling, there was no answer. 

“Aziraphale.” The voice behind him made him jump. 

“Lord,” he said, clutching his chest, “you frightened me.”

“What are you doing, Aziraphale?”

Aziraphale swallowed around the lump in his throat, “I was just looking for Raphael. I wanted to ask him something.”

“Well if you have any luck in finding him, please let me know. I can’t seem to find him anywhere,” the Almighty said, crossing her arms. 

“Why, that’s quite odd. What if he’s... needed?”

“He’s hiding, Aziraphale. He knows that retribution is coming.”

Aziraphale swallowed again and looked down at his hands, “Lord, forgive me if I overstep a boundary, but you can’t—“

“Can’t cast him out?” She asked, interrupting him, “I can. It’s just a matter of whether or not he repents. For his sake, and I’m assuming yours, I hope he does.”

“Do you know, vaguely, where he is?”

God shook Her head, “Raphael has always been good at hiding. He’s always been the most curious out of the four of them.”

Aziraphale leapt at his chance, “Which is why you should forgive him for his transgressions, Lord. He is only doing what is in his nature to do.”

“If I find him, I will speak to him. Give him one last chance to explain himself. If he can’t, or if his explanation is unsatisfactory, I will cast him out. And that’s my final decision.”

“Yes, Lord. I’ll just be going.”

Aziraphale paced his dwelling for hours, hands clasped behind his back, fingers drumming on the back of his hand. The Almighty was going to cast Raphael out with the rest of them, he was sure of it. 

In the middle of his pacing, he ran into a warm body. He looked up, “Raphael!” He grasped onto the Archangel’s arms and pulled him closer, “The Almighty has been searching everywhere for you. So have I. Where have you been?”

Raphael looked slightly down at the principality, his face unreadable, “Off elsewhere. In the stars. May be the last time I ever see them that way.”

“All you have to do is explain to Her why you’ve been asking those questions and She won’t cast you out. Please, Raphael. Please.”

Raphael reached up and stroked his fingertips down Aziraphale’s cheeks, “I don’t have an explanation, my love. I won’t be here much longer.”

Aziraphale’s eyes welled up the longer he looked at Raphael. He looked gaunt and tired, resigned to his fate. 

Aziraphale cupped Raphael’s cheeks as tears began to pour out of both of their eyes, “Raphael, please. Please, try. Stay.”

Raphael leaned forward and placed his forehead on Aziraphale’s, “I love you, but I can’t.”

There was a knock on the door of Aziraphale’s dwelling, but before either of them could answer, the Almighty let herself in, “Raphael.”

Raphael pulled away from Aziraphale, effectively pulling his unneeded heart with him, “Lord.”

“Where have you been, my son?”

“Off in the stars, Lord.” He wiped the tears away from his eyes, “I wanted to see them one last time.”

“Raphael, please,” Aziraphale said, stepping forward. 

“Aziraphale, leave it. I have no explanation for you, Lord. And I know what comes next. You already cast Lucifer out?”

The Almighty nodded, “And in demonstration, you will be next.”

She stepped forward and Raphael flinched, “Wait, Lord. Let the whole thing be the demonstration. If I can make a request, Lord?”

She nodded. 

“Let them all forget I fell.” 

He looked pointedly at Aziraphale as he spoke, the first time he had fully looked at him since he arrived. 

Aziraphale’s unneeded breath caught in his throat, “Raphael, no. Please. I don’t—“

“As you wish, my son.”

The Almighty stepped forward and placed her hand on Raphael’s shoulder. 

*

The ground beneath his feet began to open, and he could feel his wings begin to burn. He opened his eyes and looked at Aziraphale, “I love you.”

He could see his wings ablaze reflected in Aziraphale’s eyes and the pain of them could not compare to the pain he felt as he was fully ripped away from his beloved. 

He looked back to the Almighty and saw the mixture of anger and pain in Her eyes, “Archangel Raphael, I hereby cast you out of Heaven. You are amongst the ranks of the demons now.”

One final push on his shoulder and he was rocketing through space, wings burning and blackening. The last thing he heard before he hit the hard earth of Hell was Azirphale’s pained scream, “ _Raphael!_ ”

*

Years passed. Everyone around him tried to forget that he was Raphael, including himself. Best to forget what used to be. 

“Raphael,” Lord Beelzebub called, “I have a job for you.”

“Yes, Lord Beelzebub?” he replied.

“Go up there and make some trouble. I hear God has made some sort of garden and something called _humans_. They’re meant to be perfect and pure. Cause some trouble.”

“Yes, my lord.”

So that was how he ended up meeting the creations he had had so many questions about. It was how he tempted them into what She considered sin. Knowledge. Questioning. And while he had adapted to doing evil, in the vaguest terms, it still broke his heart to ruin what She had so meticulously created.

And then he saw Aziraphale. All white wings, white hair, _familiar_. He risked it. He slithered up the wall of Eden and shifted to stand next to him, “Well, that went down like a lead balloon,” he said, only looking at Aziraphale from the corner of his eyes.

“I’m sorry, what was that?” Aziraphale looked at him, and there was no recognition in those familiar blue eyes.

“I said that went down like a lead balloon.”

“Oh, yes, it did, rather.” 

Aziraphale averted his eyes, not wanting to look at the demon beside him.

“Bit of an overreaction, if you ask me. First offence and all,” Raphael said. He hoped against all hope that Aziraphale would remember, even though he was the one to ask the Almighty to wipe his Fall from the collective memory of the angels, “And I can’t see what’s so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil, anyway.”

“Well it must be bad…” he paused and looked expectantly at him.

Raphael racked his brain for a few long moments, trying to find something particularly demonic when all he could come up with was,

“Crawly.”

“Crawly.” The sounds of that foreign name coming from Aziraphale choked Raphael, or rather, Crawly’s heart, “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have tempted them into it.”

Crawly shook his head, “No, they just said go up there and make some trouble.”

“Obviously, you’re a demon. It’s what you do.”

Crawly swallowed. Even though Aziraphale didn’t know the truth, hearing the comment from the one he loved the most hurt more than he could bear. He ignored the pain and soldiered on, “Not very subtle of the Almighty, though. A big fruit tree in the middle of a garden with a ‘Don’t Touch’ sign. I mean, why not put it on top of a mountain or on the moon? Makes you wonder what God’s really planning.”

“Best not to speculate,” Aziraphale said, “It’s all part of the Great Plan. It’s not for us to understand. It’s ineffable.”

“The Great Plan’s ineffable?” 

Of course it is. Over the years, Crawly had wondered if the Fall was a part of Her plan. If having all of the ‘opposition’ out of the way was what was needed to further the universe.

“Exactly. It is beyond understanding and incapable of being put into words.”

“Hang on. Didn’t you have a flaming sword?”

Aziraphale looked even further away from him, “Er…”

“You did, it was flaming like anything. What happened to it?”

“Er…” 

“Lost it already, have you?” He wouldn’t put it passed Aziraphale, losing a sword he was issued.

“Gave it away…”

“You what?!”

“I gave it away!”

Crawly’s jaw hit the ground below him. He gave it away. To the humans. 

“There are vicious animals, it’s going to be cold out there. So I said ‘Here you go, flaming sword, don’t thank me. And don’t let the sun go down on you here.’ I do hope I didn’t do the wrong thing.”

“Oh, you’re an angel, I don’t think you can do the wrong thing.” Crawly’s throat closed over the last sentence. He wished it were true, wished that he had never done wrong.

Aziraphale lit up at it, though, “Oh, oh thank you. It’s been bothering me.”

Crawly cleared his throat, “It’s been worrying me, too. What if I got it right with the whole ‘eat the apple’ business? A demon can get in a lot of trouble for doing the right thing. It’d be funny if we both got it wrong, eh? If I did the good thing and you did the bad one?” 

He smiled wide as Aziraphale began to laugh. He wondered, for a brief moment, when the last time he laughed was. But then Aziraphale’s face turned severe, and he stopped laughing, “No, no. It wouldn’t be funny at all.”

Crawly cleared his throat and looked down as the first rain drops began to fall. Aziraphale lifted his wing slightly, high enough for Craw— Raph— Crawly to stand under. The gesture pulled on his heartstrings, as if there was something innate in Aziraphale that remembered who Crawly was. But of course, he didn’t have the strength to ask.

* 

It was centuries and centuries later until the opportunity revealed itself again. They were both incredibly drunk, the antichrist had made his appearance on Earth, and Crowley (yes another name change) wanted his angel to finally know the truth about why none of the angels had seen Raphael in sixty centuries.

“Angel,” Crowley burped, grip on his wine glass loosening for a brief moment, “I wan’ tell you s’mthin’. Ssss’portant.”

Aziraphale giggled, most likely because of Crowley’s slurs and hissing, “Go on then, my dear.”

“I’m,” he hiccuped, “I’m the Archangel Raphael.”

There was a deafening silence in the back room of the bookshop, only broken when Aziraphale began to laugh, “Crowley, dear, Raphael hasn’t been seen since the fall however many millennia ago. S’not possible.”

“Isss too. I’ll prove it. Sssober up.”

Châteauneuf-du-Pape flowed from the two entities back into the bottles. Aziraphale looked back across the room at Crowley and laughed lightly, no humor in it, “I’m sorry for laughing, dear, but Raphael hasn’t been seen in centuries. Even the Almighty doesn’t know where he is.”

Crowley took a deep breath, preparing to tell the whole truth for the first time in a long time, “There’s a reason for that, angel. That’s because I told her not to say anything. In fact, I asked her to make sure everyone forgot I fell. And it seems that she listened. And, Aziraphale, you were there when I fell.”

“Crowley, you’re talking nonsense. I wasn’t even there when Lucifer fell, and he was the demonstration!”

Crowley closed his eyes and shook his head, “I guess I’ll have to show you, then.”

Crowley rose and crossed the room, cupping Aziraphale’s face when he reached him. He focused every ounce of his memory from Before into Azirphale’s mind. Every creation, every miracle, every moment spent amongst the stars. And when he reached the Fall, he tried his best to look away, but he saw all of it, felt all of it again. He heard Aziraphale’s pained ‘ _Raphael!_ ’ as he looked up, plummeting through to Hell. 

He didn’t have the strength to open his eyes as the memories ended. He could feel the tears falling down his cheeks. He did his best to breathe through the oncoming panic when he felt Aziraphale’s hands came to rest on his cheeks, “Oh, _Crowley_.”

And that moment, right there, where Aziraphale didn’t revert back to calling him Raphael, was when Crowley knew that he understood. Aziraphale _understood_. 

“You should have said something much, much sooner. I always knew there was something missing from my heart, but I never knew what it was.”

“But angel, I was here the whole time.”

“I suppose,” he said, his face contorting in thought for a few moments, “I suppose I always knew there was something about you that you weren’t telling me. Oh, my dear, I wish you would have said something sooner. Everything makes so much more sense.”

Crowley reached to the table where he had laid his glasses, moving to put them back on, when Aziraphale caught his wrist, “Don’t, angel, I need—”

“No, you don’t,” Aziraphale said, turning Crowley’s chin to look at him, “You don’t need to hide from me, not anymore. This doesn’t change anything.”

“What do you mean, it doesn’t change anything? It changes everything! I was an Archangel, and I fell! And when I was an Archangel, I was in love with you, and I still am. I spent these last sixty centuries hoping beyond all reason that something would spark your memory, that you would just know and—”

“Crowley, dear, stop talking for a moment. Because I feel I have many things to apologize for.” Aziraphale took a deep breath, “I never knew why you, a demon, would be so kind to me, why you would always rescue me when I got into trouble. And over the years, I felt my immense gratitude for your help turn into something more, but I always thought demons couldn’t love. I thought your heart was so blackened, that even if I had said something, there would never be a possibility of you loving me back. And for that, I’m sorry.”

Crowley was silent for a long moment as more tears began streaming from his eyes. Aziraphale then wrapped him up in his arms, rubbing his back soothingly. His voice was choked as he spoke, “And whatever you want from here on in, you shall have it, my dear boy. I feel as if you think I’ve been denying you.”

“Not your fault, angel. Been stupid myself.”

“Oh, my Raphael, never.”

“Don’t want to be called that anymore. Don’t deserve it.”

Aziraphale paused for a moment, thinking, “Alright then, love. Alright. You’re a wily old serpent, you know that? Keeping this from me for so long.”

Crowley laughed, “Had to. Wasn’t sure that the world wouldn’t explode if I said something.” He paused for another moment or two, mulling over his next words, “I never really fit in up there, anyway. I was always just a little too much, a little too curious. I never really was one for taking orders. I would have been perfectly content if she had left me to my own devices up in the stars for the rest of existence.”

“You really did a wonderful job with them, darling. I can’t even fathom how the sky would look if you were still up there.”

“You know, when I took my century long nap, I dreamt I was back up there, in the stars. And I remember I tried to create more, but it never worked. I was so frustrated because it would never work, but even then, it was nice to be up there again, at least in some capacity.”

Aziraphale was silent as he took in Crowley’s words, “I wish I could fix it, my love. Undo your fall, or if I could’ve done something to stop it back then.”

“I did everything I could to stop you from doing exactly that. I didn’t want you to be guilty by association. But I guess that was unavoidable. I couldn’t have kept away from you in the Garden even if I had tried.”

“What do you want now, dear boy? Do you want it to stay like it was, move on like you never told me, or do you want back what we had before the fall?”

“I want back what we had. Be my angel. Always be my angel.”

“And how do you want me to see you?” Aziraphale asked, pulling back from the embrace, looking into Crowley’s eyes.

“I want you to see me as you’ve seen me for the past six thousand years. The wily old serpent from the Garden, the one that tempted you into contributing to the chaos. One of the ones that started it all.”

“Contributing to the chaos, huh? Is that what we’ve been doing all these years?” 

“Instead of watching and complaining, absolutely.”

Crowley smiled for the first time since sobering up, and Aziraphale followed suit, effectively brightening the whole room and mood. Aziraphale leaned forward and kissed him lightly, smiling wider when he pulled back, “Thank you for giving me back what I didn’t know was missing.”

“Thank you for understanding and still being here.”

“Always. Forever.” He leaned in to kiss Crowley again, and laughed when he tried to deepen it, “Wily old serpent.”

“Angel.”


End file.
